The Warforge Miniature Modelling and Conversion

Burny Death Hugs

So, thanks to Zsoulless' help, Redemptor Thanasius looks to be pretty much done, with some minor exceptions.

The "Hellfire Gauntlet" (which is simply what I've decided to call it; Vulkan's has a fancy name, it's only fair) is now finished-off, though not yet actually attached, so don't worry about the gap between the body and the arm. I'm well aware he looks like he wants a hug, but I think it's really only due to the open palm, since the posture is identical to the standard Power Armor Chaplain now. Either way, I still think he looks great.

I'm going to add a bit of cabling hanging from the plug in the bottom of the gauntlet that runs up the arm and to the fuel tanks in the backpack... and a skull has also been added to the knee pad of the leading knee, just because it seemed an appropriate place to put it.

I am probably going to have to do a fair bit of practicing on some older metal marines before I'm comfortable painting this guy. He shouldn't be the first thing I paint for the army, at least, since I want to do a decent job on him and I need to get the hang of painting black armor first.

Anyway, he's pretty much done. I'm not certain if I'm keeping his 'Redemptor' title, since it sounds a bit inquisitorial, but I wanted something as catchy as 'Forgefather'. The name Thanasius is staying for sure, though; it's a corruption of the greek word 'athanasius', which means 'immortal death', if the internet is to be believed.

Fist of Fury

So, I have to share this, both because it's a nice step in progress on the model and because of how awesome it's going.

First thing's first: Because this guy is going to be sort've a figurehead for my army, and because I can't sculpt worth a damn, I'm now working very closely with a friend of mine named Zsoulless from The Waaagh.com. Z is not only a disturbingly talented artist but a truly excellent sculptor, and I've managed to talk him into helping me make the Huronesque flamer-fist design I'd previously whipped up.

Well, Z's come through in a big way. He's gotten a start on the Gauntlet, and it's looking really fantastic.

These are his pictures, so they're not quite as large as my usual, but I think the details are still fairly clearly awesome. The fist borrows the concept of having the flamer nozzle in the palm from Huron, and Z's added a very convincing mechanical assembly on the back of the gauntlet that includes a fuel tank and hoses. There's a plug on the bottom of the gauntlet for an eventual cable that will lead up the arm and, presumably, into the backpack with the brazier and big fuel tanks.

Z's also come up with a brilliant substitute for Kesare's Mantle by making a skull press-mold cloak. Now, instead of being layered in dragonscales, the Vulkan counts-as will have souls of the damned screaming out from his tattered cloak. I think if I could paint them up to look a bit ethereal (maybe some grey-blue highlights on a black cloak, to make them look ghostly) it'd be awesome.

The scythe bit is something I figured out before I sent it over to Z. After looking around for inspiration, I actually discovered a great miniature with a very nice scythe - Reaper's Death Priest. After eyeballing the dimensions of the scythe up a bit, I ordered one, and it seems to be a pretty perfect fit. There's a paperclip running down the middle of the styrene tube in the handle that serves as a pin for the scythe's head; wraps that match the chaplain's existing handle will hopefully be sculpted up to the head of the scythe over the white styrene part. I was also thinking that it'd look great if the skull that serves as the base for the blade were lit aflame, so that'll need some attention. Going to have to practice some OSL if I want this model pop, I think.

Anyway, I'm really excited about where this model's going now that I have Z's help on the greenstuff end.

Concept sketch for the Gauntlet

Just thought I'd pitch this up here, as I've been receiving some reasonably good ideas from my readers and I wanted to show what I was thinking.

I actually really like the idea of the gauntlet-flamer being something like what Huron Blackheart has. I've talked to one of my talented sculpting friends, Zsoulless from over at The Waaagh, about maybe having a custom arm sculpted up, because the more I think about this design the  more I like it.

I've considered using Huron's actual arm, and modifying it a bit, but I'm not entirely sure if that'd work - it's a very chaotic piece, and the hand would have to be totally remodelled.

In any case, this is something I'm going to endeavor to make before I default to my heavy flamer arm backup. I sort've want to take a crack at maybe sculpting it myself, just to see what happens but I have no idea where to begin - probably an armature of paperclip or something, and then the basic cylindrical arm shape, but I can't imagine sculpting fingers like that properly.

Burning sensation

So I think I'm probably going with the ol' Termie heavy flamer arm for my counts-as Vulkan. I gave slinging a flamer nozzle under the stock chaplain fist a shot, and I'm really not happy with it. I've just kind've roughly puttied it on there, to be sanded and filed once it hardens, but truthfully my sculpting skills have never quite been up to par and this is a prime example of that in action.

The concept's there, I guess but truthfully I think the heavy flamer arm'd end up better in the long run.

Redeeming Features

Hey guys!

First off, I'll apologize for not having updated these past two weeks. School's been hectic, and I've been taking a class during the law school's 'winter semester', which is basically just the few days leading up to the regular semester. Still, there's time for a few admittedly small updates, so I figure I might as well get cracking on that.

The Legion army I hope to eventually play is going to be, basically, 'Saladamnders', to borrow a phrase coined by a friend. The regular legionnaire will be your standard Tactical Marine, but I'm going to go melta and flamer heavy with the army to fit their fiery style. Because of this, I need a 'counts-as' Vulkan He'stan character for the army. I do, of course, have my old Vulkan conversion to consider, but he doesn't seem very Legion-esque, all told, so I think starting from scratch'd probably be a good course of action.

After a bit of deliberation, I decided that I really liked this Chaplain as the base for the conversion.

He's already got the bone motif in the form of the ribcage on his armor and the skull helmet, and his arms-wide-open pose should lend itself to some easy converting.

Now, let's talk wargear for a moment. Since I'm making a counts-as Vulkan, I need to pretty much match Vulkan's armament. This means my character needs the Gauntlet of the Forge, Vulkan's Spear, and Kesare's Mantle; basically, a big flamer-glove, some sort of mean looking relic weapon, and a badass cloak.

The spear is probably the outright easiest of the bunch to replace - the chaplain model above is already holding his Crozius pretty nicely, and I figure I can hack the mace-like eagle head off the thing and lengthen it out.

Given that this is the Legion of the Damned we're talking about, nothing would be more appropriate here than a scythe for the Grim Reaper / Death connotations. With that said, I set about planning the scythe out a bit, and quickly produced the mock-up parts below:

You'll notice I have one blade that's basically nicked and rougher looking, and one that's otherwise normal. I think I'm probably going for the nicked blade design instead, since I doubt the Legion get to resupply or repair their stuff that often. Still, you'll get the idea of what I'm going for - going to hack the crozius down, lengthen the shaft a bit, and attach the scythe head right to it. If I feel really bold, I may take a shot at sculpting some flames bleeding upwards off the scythe blade - we'll see.

Now, the Gauntlet of the Forge stand-in is not nearly as simple, unfortunately. On my old Vulkan conversion, I used an Apothecary arm and replaced the drill/surgical bits with the flamer. Unfortunately, there is no right-arm Apothecary bit, so my options there are substantially more limited. I've been brainstorming a bit about what I could do for the right arm, and I thought I'd lay out the options I've come up with and see what all of you thought.

For point of reference, the Gauntlet of the Forge works like an Assault Heavy Flamer - Vulkan can just spit out flamer templates like nothing.

I have two arms that I'm currently considering using for the right side. The first one is an actual Heavy Flamer arm, taken from a 3rd edition metal terminator. The upside to this is that it's pretty clear why the dude's firing a heavy flamer template, and the 3rd edition shoulders for termies are almost the same size as current Power Armor... so the whole arm is pretty much properly in scale.

 

It's probably the most simple, and I could sculpt flames onto the shoulder pad to Legion it up pretty easily. The downside here is that it's not some crazy gimmicky gauntlet, just a dude with a heavy flamer, which eliminates some of the 'cool' factor.

The other gauntlet idea I've been thinking about involves the old Marneus Calgar model. He has a bolter in his glove, though, but I figure I could hack the ammo feed, replace it with a hose, and put a nozzle on it...

 

The downsides to this one are a bit larger - first, I'm ruining an older model that's hard to get nowadays. Second, the eagle-motif on the shoulder pad doesn't exactly fit Legion designs.Third, I'd still have to do some extensive conversion to make that stormbolter look like anything other than a stormbolter.

I could probably mock up the same kind of under-slung weapon design as what's on this arm onto the stock Power Fist that comes with the Chaplain model, but that opens up a whole new set of issues: mainly, the fact that Vulkan doesn't actually have a power fist.

I'd be interested in hearing ideas from you guys. It's actually a bit of a shame that Vulkan's gauntlet is lefty, because I'd just as happily carve his arm up and put it on my guy if I could.

As far as Kesare's Mantle goes, I have that cloak angle covered... but that's secret for now!